4 thoughts on “The Iron Writer Weekend Quickie #235”

The heat is coming on and it isn’t even noon yet. Recovering in my lounge chair, I watch the plastic pink flamingo drift on the current from the pool’s pump, a relic left behind after the grandkids left last night.
I should have gotten it out of the pool last night when we were finished. It floats aimlessly, resting after the workout the lady and I gave it last night.
I don’t swim. Never could. So most summer nights, I drift along naked, riding that ugly pink nightmare, while the woman of my life swims circles around me, equally clad.
Last night she found me there after it was lights out, consuming the remains of the watergate salad from the refrigerator, trying to stay cool.
It didn’t work last night. The cool part. It is difficult for me to stay frigid when she taunts me so. I was surprised the pink flamingo withstood the pounding.

Mrs. Harrison smiled at her three boys and suggested, “You boys could play in the pool while you wait for the guests to arrive.” Being the youngest, only 5, Irving leapt at the suggestion and shouted, “I call dibs on the pink flamingo!” and he ran through the living room, out the sliding glass doors and threw the pink inflatable into the pool, but before he could jump in after it, Billy, being eight, came running up and grabbed Irving by the shoulder. “Irving, you can’t put the flamingo in the pool before we have guests over.” Irving stopped smiling and looked puzzled, “Why not, Billy?” “Irving, flamingos are birds and birds always mess up the water.” Bobby overheard this statement, looked at Billy with a wink and a nod, snatched a tub of Watergate salad from the buffet table, and slipped quietly into the water while Billy had Irving distracted. Without making a sound,Bobby got up inside the middle of the inflatable and began to make it move around in the pool. Billy turned Irving around and pointed out, “Look, its already trying to move away so we can’t get it out.

Irving ran over to the far side of the pool, but Bobby turned the flamingo and swam away from Irving Irving seemed frustrated, “He’s swimming away, Billy. What are we gonna do?” “I don’t know, Irving, But we gotta get him out before the guests arrive.

Sally and Meagan, the two girls Irving’s age from next door walked up as Irving was running back around the pool trying to head the flamingo off. The flamingo reacted suddenly so Billy shouted to Irving, “Don’t startle him, Irving He might …” But Bobby was on que and dumped the Watergate salad out the back end of the flamingo.

Irving’s jaw dropped in dismay while the two girls shrieked and ran into the house complaining to Mrs. Harrison that the flamingo had pooped in the pool, and it was really gross.

Even for his standards, I think Vance went a little overboard last night at the pool party, especially with the large pink flamingo inflatable. At first we thought he was swimming with it while doing some bastardized breast stroke – he looked so wasted – but as soon as we saw he was skinny-dipping, face slaps echoed over the music as we realised what he was doing. Richard and Michael dived in to ‘rescue’ the poor bird before Vance popped, but that didn’t stop most of the girls from being disgusted and leaving. The party went downhill from there. Mathew dived from the roof to find the pool wasn’t deep enough. Thankfully he’d kept his helmet on so he only suffered a minor concussion, which is more than I can say for the pool. Brian wanted everyone to join together in a sing-song but his choice wasn’t such a big hit – the birdie song. I guess the pink flamingo is kind of a big imagination draw when you’re drunk. Took us a while to get him off the thing, too. But what Mamie did with the Watergate salad, we shall have to keep a secret or the neighbors will call the cops.